The present invention relates to furnishings for offices and other similar settings, and in particular, to a mounting arrangement for light fixtures in overhead cabinets, cases, or the like.
Open office plans are well known in the art, and generally comprise large, open floor spaces that are partitioned off into individual workstations. One arrangement for partitioning off the open floor space is to provide movable partition panels that are configured to receive hang-on furniture units, such as worksurfaces, overhead cabinets, shelves, etc. Such partitioning arrangements are usually known in the office furniture industry as "systems furniture".
A unique alternative arrangement for dividing and partitioning open office plans is disclosed in related co-pending application Ser. No. 307,775 pending, filed Feb. 7, 1989, entitled MODULAR FURNITURE, which has been incorporated by reference into the present application. This new arrangement provides a plurality of individual furniture units, each of which is independently supported on the floor of the open office. The freestanding furniture units have a novel modular construction which permits them to be individually arranged and combined in predetermined configurations to create distinct workstations.
In both systems furniture and modular furniture arrangements, light fixtures may be mounted underneath overhead cabinets, upper cases, or similar storage units to provide task lighting for the worksurface disposed therebelow. Heretofore, such light fixtures were attached directly to the bottom of the overhead cabinet by conventional fasteners, such as threaded screws or the like. Exemplary task lighting arrangements are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,203,639 and 4,432,044. In such mounting arrangements, the position of the light fixture in the cabinet is fixed, and cannot be readily adjusted once it is fastened in place. Furthermore, the relative size and weight of the light fixture, as well as the rather difficult location and orientation of attachment, renders installation of the light fixture both awkward and time consuming, and often requires more than one skilled installer.